Fare Thee Well, Era

This weekend my youngest sister is getting married in a civil ceremony in Texas.  About a month and a half later we're throwing a big reception in her hometown.  This is the last sister, the last sibling in fact, to get married.

It's really hitting me. I didn't think we'd be done with weddings for a long time. I don't know what I thought: that there was a long train of yet unknown brothers and sisters still to get married? Or that our spouses would (God forbid) die or even worse that there isn't some kind of permanence to our marriages, and we would do it over again.

I just didn't think about all of us, grown up, blowing a kiss to our childhood as we watch her march down the aisle.

We don't fight anymore (much).  There is no more competing for dominance or bathrooms.  My brother hasn't thrown a hairbrush at my head since at least 1989. Even, and most grievously, a lifelong nickname seems to be in its twilight.

Shouldn't someone always be "there" (single? under 30? wildly inappropriate and immature? I'm not sure what I mean by "there.") to remind us that we were kids together and had been a cohesive unit?  That the four of us were the original family that branched off and started little seedling families?  I thought there would be.

I don't feel like I have enough hugs to give that last vestige of our youth before she puts on that white dress.